


Doing the Work

by Milly_Blank



Category: The Owl House (Cartoon)
Genre: Aged-Up Character(s), Luz is Lilith's apprentice, Older Luz, Slice of Life, au i guess, time skip, two plus years in the future
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-04-28
Updated: 2020-04-28
Packaged: 2021-03-01 18:00:45
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,825
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23901226
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Milly_Blank/pseuds/Milly_Blank
Summary: Lilith told Luz being a great witch was about hard work, well each day she's trying to follow that instruction. Being Lilith's apprentice is very hard work.Set about three years since Luz first found the Boiling Isles.
Relationships: Lilith Clawthorne & Luc Noceda
Comments: 5
Kudos: 57





	Doing the Work

Luz dunked her pen into the inkwell and watched it fill quickly. She gently wiped the side of the pen off and turned her attention back to her notes and worksheets. The empty classroom was shaded in a deep blue as Lilith stood near the window watching Luz. Grimoires and textbooks sat, open, spread across the table. 

Luz wiggled the pen a bit in one of her gloved hands, while she ran her fingers through her hair with the other. Luz stared down at the highly detailed and highly intricate diagrams and glyphs. Luz let a soft sigh whistle through her lips. 

And just like that she had lost focus. Luz felt her mind wander. Thinking about mistakes and concerns...her doubts. A lot has changed in the nearly three years since Luz discovered the boiling isles and for some reason this moment made it all feel so very surreal. All of this felt so mundane now. It was exciting still. But, now, instead of the intense strangeness and whimsical excitement she felt when she first followed Owlbert through that door, it was a small excited. An excitement she used to feel knowing her mother was cooking her favorite dinner that night. 

Luz's mother had agreed to let Luz live in the Boiling Isles after several difficult conversations. She was shocked when Luz had told her about magic....about how she could do magic...about how she had been sleeping in a closet. The look on her face made her ashamed. Like Luz wasn't taking her own well being into account. The moment she told her, her mother insisted she move into the hexside dorms. 

It's years later and Luz still regrets not being honest with her mother right away. Another thing to be needlessly worried about. 

"Luz. You're daydreaming again. What did I tell you about focus?" Lilith admonished her from her place across the room. 

"Sorry, ma'am." Luz quickly turned her head back down toward her paper. Plant magic was not her strong suit and all these glyphs were nonsensical. There never seemed to be many reliable patterns in plant magic. Each rune seemed to be random. At least most schools the runes seemed to build on each other, grow more intricate or more stripped down depending on the spell. But plants were....wild.

Luz thought about Willow a moment. 

She then tried to turn her thoughts back to magic. But it felt so hard today. 

"Luz, I think it's time to end for the day." Lilith said, her tone clearly showing some frustration with Luz's being so clearly distracted. At least that's how it felt to her. 

"I'm sorry Ma'am....I'm sorry...I promise I can focus!" Luz stood and turned to Lilith. "It's just that this particular series of runes are...." Luz searched for the right word. Her first instinct was to say 'stupid' but instead said "....Difficult."

Lilith gave a soft sigh. "Just because it's difficult doesn't mean you're allowed to not do the work, Luz." Her tone was some muddled mix of motherly and intensely detached. It reminded her of the tone Luz's mother took during rougher phone calls.

"I know." Luz quietly replied. 

"It's the hard work that makes a great witch, Luz. I think you can be one, you've shown to be very diligent and quick learner, but you can't let your self get lost in distraction. Do you understand?" Luz gave a nod. "That's all for today. Tomorrow I want to see how your binding spells are coming."

"Yes, ma'am." 

"Dismissed." 

Luz gave a formal bow and then quickly moved her things back into her bag while Lilith opened the large orniate wooden door and held it patiently. Luz tied on her heavy cloak over herself, and pulled her gloves snugg under her pale orange sleeves. Bag in hand Luz gave a gentle nod to Lilith as she left the room. 

"Good night, Luz."

"Good night, ma'am."

Luz made her way through the main courtyard. The steady, cold wind whipped the tail of her cloak in the air. Some students gave her a small wave, as she walked down toward the south part of the Hexside campus, toward the stables. Luz pulled her ponytail tighter as she dropped down below the hill and followed the path to a low flat pasture. The grassy field was framed by a grouping of pens and barns. 

Having the path ingrained in her mind, she absentmindedly found herself to one barn in particular. Luz saw a group of students from her Beast Keeping 302 class and they shared some pleasantries as she headed toward a stall housing a large red cat, about the size of a Clydesdale horse. 

The cat's tail began to sway as it slowly climbed to its feet to greet Luz. "Hi girl." Luz's hands ran along the animal's soft short fur. She thought for a moment and then pulled off one of her gloves and with a bare hand began to pet again. "How you doing, Hecate? Huh? Huh girl?" The beast let out a slow and silly yawn. "Same, girl, same." 

Luz slid her glove back on, turned back toward the center of the barn, and headed for a large barrel. She pulled out a metal scoop and dug it into the barrel and pulled out chunks of processed hooves and brain meat. She found her way back to Hecate. 

The mess of sticky meat dropped from the scoop and into a large bowl on the other side of the gate to Hecate's stall. "There you go! Eat up!" Luz giggled as she watched the beast purr as it ate. She had already fed Hecate twice today but sometimes when she was feeling stressed it was nice to slip in before heading home and give Hecate a little treat and affection before bed. 

Luz pulled a stool close and sat and watched her beast. Before she knew it Luz had watched Hecate eat the whole bowl and settle down against the stall door and drift off to a sound rest. She watched the animal take slow deep breaths, her ribs expanding and dropping over and over. It was such a soothing thing. Just watching an animal sleep. 

Before she knew it, Luz found herself the only student left in the barn. She looked around a moment before turning her eyes back to Hecate. "I guess I should go too, girl." Luz stood and picked up her bag. "Love you. Sleep tight." She whispered. Hecate only response being a small huff she made in her sleep. Luz smiled and then headed back out into the cold night air. 

* * * * *

The door to Luz's dorm room creaked open as she quietly made her way in. She ran her fingers in the air, and in an instant a ball of light floated to the center of the room, spreading a soft warm orange glow . Luz unfastened the buckle on her heavy cloak and slid it off her shoulders,gently placing it on the back of a wooden chair by the door. 

Her tired eyes surveyed the room. It was small, and a mess, aside from her desk. She had promised Lilith that she would 'make her work space a sanctuary' and dedicated a good amount of her energy maintaining and organizing it. Luz placed her bag by her desk chair and made her way toward her bed.

She had her own room, which surprised her when she was first given it. Apparently only a very small percentage of Hexside's students lived on campus these days, so, some years ago the dorms were remodeled. One of the former housing buildings had been converted into an onsite healing center and another a new potions lab. 

Luz's room only really consisted of a bed, a small dresser, a desk, a couple chairs, a small kitchen island with a built in sink, and a bathroom. Luz had lugged a mini fridge from the market one day, but quickly realized there were no outlets in her room, which she hadn't even thought to look for, so it sat unused by the door that led out to a small balcony. 

Luz slid open the wooden sliding door a crack and let a small whistle of bitter cold air leak into her room. She gave small sigh and unbuttoned her hexside cloak, and gently hung it on a coat hook affixed to the bathroom door. Luz entertained the thought of taking off her gloves, but instead kept them on.

They were on her hands nearly every moment of the day, outside of the bathroom. She had, with Lilith's guidance, made them herself. They were made of a material enchanted in a similar way as a wand or staff, but unlike those, her gloves didn't hold any magic charge. They were 'conduits' as Lilith had put it. Luz had cut the material, pulled the tread, and sown them all with her own hands. She had to. These gloves were hers. They drew the magic from her. And with them she could draw her glyphs on any surface, even the empty air, with only her fingers.

The moment, after many many poorly stitched and botched gloves, they finally worked made her so overjoyed that she caught herself wrapping Lilith up in her arms and jumping up and down. Lilith, simply waited for Luz to release her and gave her a gentle proud pat on the shoulder. Luz remembers the small proud smile she gave. Those moments were rare with Lilith. But when they came Luz found all the work worth it. 

Even if she was almost always exhausted. 

Luz pulled out her advanced magical bindings and restraints text book, along with a large and heavily worn notebook and began to read quietly to herself while she slouched down onto the floor under her light ball. The wooden slats on the sliding door rattled a little from wind as Luz yawned and turned the page, scribbling something quickly in her notes and returning to the book. 

Suddenly Luz awoke in the dark. She ran her finger through the air again, tracing a light glyph that now felt like such a basic part of her, and there was another small light ball above her head. She looked down and realized she must have dozed off into her homework. 

Luz let out a small huff and sleepily pulled off her school tunic and tights, pulled on a big shirt crumpled on her bed, slid the balcony door closed and gently placed her folded school clothes on her desk chair. She was chattering, the chill from the window must have woken her. She gathered her book and notes up off the floor and lazily slid them into her bag.

She wiggled onto her bed and into a comfortable position under her heavy blanket, curling in on herself a bit. The shiver slowly faded as she felt a warm gentle sleep overtake her.


End file.
